EDUCATION: UCR researcher studies little-known cells

In his proposed budget for 2016, President Obama has included a 6 percent increase for research sponsored by the National Science Foundation. The $146 billion for research and development would be split evenly between defense and civilian spending.

The president has long been an advocate for basic research, which is primarily what the agency funds. Such research doesn’t necessarily lead to immediate practical results but often explores the questions of how things work.

A good example of that is contained in a newly published paper by UC Riverside professor of biomedical science Martin Garcia-Castro, which appears on the website dev.biologists.org.

A new arrival at UCR – he came here in November 2014 – Garcia-Castro works with an obscure type of cell called a neural crest cell. Found in the early development of the embryo, the cell is responsible for building a number of different specialized structures such as peripheral nerves and skin color cells. They also determine how you look.

“They’re responsible for making your face,” Garcia-Castro said.

If they don’t develop correctly, it can result in such conditions as cleft palate and skin cancer.

“They're involved in many diseases,” he said.

Garcia-Castro said he hopes his work can eventually translate into therapies that will help such conditions. But, he said, scientists have a long way to go before that can happen. Right now, he said, despite the fact the cells were initially identified in 1868, much about them remains a mystery.

“People have struggled to define where these cells are formed,” he said.

Pretty much all of our bodies’ cells fall into three categories: ectoderm, which create skin and the central nervous system; mesoderm, which make muscles and bones; and endoderm, from which internal organs are constructed. But neural crest cells fall outside of those three. They can differentiate into skin, muscle and bone.

But to study them and find out how they really work, you first have to grow them.

Garcia-Castro and his team have found a better way to do that, cutting what was once a 15-day procedure, at minimum, to just five days. They have been able to do it with a growth medium that the scientist says is much cleaner – fewer chemicals – than methods up until this point. That makes it easier, he said, to account for the influences such chemicals might have on a cell’s behavior.

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